Page Title

Orianne Varsha
Kadima Heschel West MS
West Hill, CA

            The Memory Of Miriam and Yakov Gueta

     It all started on the early morning of April 11, 1974. Terrorists snuck un-detected
into an Israeli city by the name of Kiriat Shmona. Their plan was to kill the entire
student body at a school named Korchov. Ironically their plan did not go as they
wanted because kids were on vacation due to the holiday of Passover. But these were
trained killers and they did not want to go back home without executing a mission to
murder innocent civilians. Therefore, they decided to murder all the people in the
apartment building closest to the school.
    They broke into the building and went from one apartment to the other shooting
everyone they saw. My great aunt Miriam was in her apartment, six months pregnant
and resting. All of a sudden she heard screaming and gunshots, not knowing what was
happening inside her building, she opened the door. A girl was running and screaming
that there were terrorists with guns killing everybody. Without thinking twice Miriam
held on to the girl's hand and pushed her into her apartment to hide for safety. Miriam
then distracted the terrorists by running to the opposite direction of her apartment so
the terrorists would follow her instead of the girl. While she was running away from the
terrorists she was also screaming for help. Her husband, Yakov, heard her while
walking up the stairs. He quickly ran to their apartment to see what was going on when
he and Miriam were both unfortunately shot and killed.
    Miriam and Yakov would have been my great aunt and uncle. The way my family
found out what had happened was full of confusion. They didn't know if Miriam or
Yakov survived or not. One of Miriams sisters, Nachama, was listening to the radio on
the way home and heard all the names of the victims in the tragedy. Later on that
month she gave birth to a baby girl and named her Miriam. Nachama was pregnant
and gave birth to a baby girl and named her Miriam. All of Miriam's brothers and sisters
showed up at the parents house to comfort each-other from all the sorrow. It was the
most difficult and traumatic moment for everybody to observe and experience.
    Following Jewish tradition, the funerals for all the victims was held the next day.
Eight-teen victims, eight of which were children, were carried in coffins inside of eight-
teen army cars. They went around the city before they arrived to the cemetery for
burial. During the funueral my family was thinking how aunt Miriam was a very special
person in many ways. She was a nurse for pregnant women and newborn babies.
When she died they buried all the kids that had died all around her. They also named
the maternity clinic after her.
    In 1974, my mother, Ilanit, was only four years old when she learned of the death of
her aunt, Miriam. Not knowing much about the assault and not being able to explain
what she was feeling due to her age, her reaction to the whole crisis was hugging her
grieving mother, Mazal and asking her; “Mom will I ever get married?” Of course the
answer was, “yes.” The second questions was; “Will I ever have kids of my own?”
Again the answer was, “yes”. That was when Ilanit said to her mother, “Then I promise
you that the day will come and I will bring you back Miriam”, and put a deep emphasis
on her name.
    My name is Orianne Simcha. I was born April 11, 1995, twenty-one years later to
the exact date of the Miriam's death. I entered into this world on a very special and sad
day. My mother wouldn't name me Miriam because, after her early and not natural
death, it is bad luck to name the baby after her. Instead she named me Orianne. In life,
even after such a horrible experience, a bit of happiness can always come and that is
what my family says I brought. My middle name, Simcha, meaning joy and happiness
was given to me for this reason. Even though the memory of Miriam and Yakov Gueta
can never be fully erased from our hearts, something good can always come.

This story comes from an interview that I carried out with my great aunt: Yaafa Rubin,
February 2, 2009.